


And then the nightmares will begin

by AnnaofAza



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Character Study, Hallucinations, M/M, Mutual Pining, Season/Series 01, Shiro (Voltron) Has PTSD - Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Shiro (Voltron)-centric, Unreliable Narrator, partially inspired by House of Leaves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-29
Updated: 2019-06-29
Packaged: 2020-05-20 20:58:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19384540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnnaofAza/pseuds/AnnaofAza
Summary: After the team takes Sendak prisoner, Shiro thinks he can finally move forward. But then, one by one, his friends, the castle, and his mind start turning against him.





	And then the nightmares will begin

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to the ineffable futuredescending for beta-ing, encouraging, and putting up with my frantic notes. 
> 
> This fic was heavily inspired by House of Leaves, and the title comes from the novel.

He’s defeated, kneeling with arms locked behind his back. Beside him, Lance is unconscious, his chest moving falteringly by the second. The Arusian village is burning, smoke rising steadily into the air of a planet that’s been safe for years and years. And there’s the alarm blaring like a klaxon in time with the pounding in his head, Sendak with his hands poised over the controls, threatening Pidge, trapped in the castle.

Sendak. How he’d reveled in torturing prisoners, in attending every gladiator match, in hunting down hapless civilians.

 _Failure, failure, failure_ drums in his bones. He feels it as deeply as the cold sinking into his knees, as if any minute he’ll rise to his feet—even now, readying himself for a fight that he’s sure to lose.

But he still tries to keep track of his advantages, a strategy held over from the Garrison. Pidge is in the castle, being aided by the princess and Keith. (What a shock it must have been to come back to a particle barrier, hair and armor still stinking of smoke.) He’s not exactly knowledgeable of the princess’s combat skills, but she knows more about the castle than any of them, and Keith—he remembers their sparring sessions, both at the Garrison and their limited time here; he stands at least a fighting chance. With Pidge, Allura, Keith, and himself (maybe), that’s four (again, maybe) against two, if Haxus is still a player.

But so much depends on _if._ If Coran and Hunk return with a new crystal before the castle launches. If Pidge manages to depower the barrier without getting caught by Haxus. If Keith and Allura can even get through, if they can even stand head-to-head with Sendak—

Heavy footsteps approach, and Shiro tenses at the sound. But he raises his chin, trying not to flinch away from Sendak’s glowing eyes, his pointed sneer. “What do you want?” he demands.

With a crackle of energy, Sendak’s arm powers up. “Your friend wanted to hear from you.”

“Pidge,” he calls, intending to give encouragement, but panic seeps into that one word without his permission. He realizes with some disgust, he’s afraid for himself. Scared of pain—he thought he was beyond that. But Shiro remembers the kick to his back, his hands colliding with the cold metal floor, the smell of burning flesh on his back, as the prisoner ship drifted further and further away from the world he knew.

“Pidge,” Shiro tries again. He tells himself to hold it together. To give Pidge enough courage to make it, to not worry about him. To stay strong. 

But in the end, he still screams.

* * *

Like most kids, Shiro had a space phase.   

There were the glow-in-the-dark stars stuck to his ceiling, the models of spaceships crammed on top of his dresser, the occasional Galaxy Garrison recruitment poster taped to the inside of his bedroom door, the brightly-colored books full of space facts that he’d memorized but still displayed prominently on the bookshelves he religiously dusted every weekend under the strict eye of his mother.  

He had a map taped onto his bedroom wall, where he’d pinned each planet and satellite body explored by humans. First moon landing, even though it was child’s play by now. First Mars exploration. He knew all the missions, the spaceships, the astronauts by heart, going over them at night again and again until they blended together like a song. 

His parents indulged him—after all, they’d been through this before. Dinosaurs. Wild West. Old radios. A Saturday morning cartoon, or the latest superhero comic.  

But then came Calypso.  

First mission to carry ships to the seventy-nine moons of Jupiter. No wonder, Shiro had thought, as he rewatched the footage on his datapad underneath the covers for the hundredth time, it had taken three years.  

Shiro had read about cores and orbits and satellites. The ships prior: Pioneer, Voyager, Cassini, New Horizons, Galileo, Juno. The innermost moon, he read, was volcanic. He looked at slideshows and videos of bright-blue magma rising and falling like the tides. Europa was the next one— _were they all named after cows from Greek mythology?_ he’d wondered—with the exact opposite: ice blanketing the planet in both solid and sludge, a potential for life. Then, Ganymede— _okay, so not all of them were cows, or women,_ and the latter was a possibility he hadn’t considered for himself until then—the largest and only moon that scientists said had its own “internally-generated magnetic field.” (He had to do some reading on his datapad, peppering his science teachers with endless questions.) He even devoured an old anime about a bounty hunter and his team hopping across Jupiter’s moons. 

But most of all, Shiro liked tiptoeing into his backyard with its overgrown grass and craning his neck to look up at Jupiter, trying to imagine people up there. How they must have felt, braving the unknown, being among the stars, looking down at Earth. 

It wasn’t impossible, not anymore. It wasn’t supposed to be. But for him...well, it wasn’t _practical._ Shiro could read the intentions beneath that one word. It rang in his head when a recruiter from the Galaxy Garrison came to his school—Sam Holt, in fact.

It was the most rebellious thing he’d ever done up to that point, putting down his name. But, Shiro had justified, he might as well give it a shot—you only live once, after all, and his life was going to be shorter than most.  

* * *

It’s over, he tells himself. It’s over.

Still, Shiro flinches when Sendak’s fist uselessly smashes against the newly-formed particle barrier with a heavy thud. But there’s no need to be afraid—on guard—about Sendak now. He’s safely contained, a prisoner like Shiro was.

The thought unsettles him, so much so that when Pidge’s hand lands on his shoulder, Shiro recoils so sharply that the other paladin quickly jerks away. “You okay?” she asks uncertainly.  

Shiro nods, hoping it looks convincing. “Just a little sore. Thank you for coming back.”  

“You’re my team,” Pidge says, and they both look to where Lance and Keith are, Lance clearly struggling to hold his head up. He looks awful—bruises across his face and an obviously-pained grin, eyes slightly unfocused. _He must have a concussion,_ Shiro thinks. It was a miracle the Blue Paladin managed to shoot Sendak.  

“He needs a healing pod,” Allura says, stepping back from the controls. “Right away.”  

“I’m fine,” Lance says, then immediately collapses when he tries to stand up, only stopped from hitting the floor head-first at the last minute by Keith. “Never mind.”  

“Can you walk?” Keith asks, arm hoisted around his waist.

“No,” Lance slurs, but manages to throw a dazed wink at Allura. “I feel pretty weak, might need someone to carry me...”  

Shiro, despite the situation, rolls his eyes. “I will,” he says, then ignoring Lance’s groan and Pidge’s stifled laughter, scoops up Lance, careful to support his head.  

Allura leads the way up to the deck without a backward glance, then with a few swipes of her fingers, keys in a code to allow a pod to rise from the castle floor. Normally, Pidge would be asking rapid-fire questions about Altean technology with Lance making references to old sci-fi movies and Keith rolling his eyes at a lame joke, but all of them are completely silent as Shiro wrangles Lance into the healing pod.  

Pidge bites her lip as the cool blue glass closes over his body. “Will he—”  

“He’ll be alright,” Allura reassures. “There’s nothing else we can do until tomorrow.”  

“I can take patrol,” Shiro immediately says. Even if Sendak is out of commission, there still might be threats, and if he called for backup... 

Allura shakes her head. “No. You all need rest. The castle’s defenses are secure, and I detect no incoming threats. I think it’s best that we all stay inside for now to recover while we wait for Coran and Hunk.” She looks at Shiro, concerned, and he wonders how bad he looks. “Would you like a healing pod as well?”  

“No,” Shiro says. He doesn’t like the idea of being in stasis, down for the count in case something happens—or having something foreign work on his body without him being aware. Keith looks worried, too, but luckily doesn’t say anything. “I just need rest. That goes for everyone.” And with a final nod, Shiro begins the walk down the hall.

He failed them. His team could have died, the castle and the lions in the hands of the Galra, the galaxy that much closer to total domination. If Pidge hadn’t decided to come back…

Glowing claws at his throat, Lance lying limply in Haxus’s grasp, himself being knocked to the ground, head ringing. And fear, the familiar taste of it—

“Shiro? Are you okay?”  

A hand on his shoulder. Keith. Shiro takes a deep breath. “I should be asking you that,” he says lightly. “You charged Sendak.” He remembers the clang of metal on metal, the purple glow of Sendak’s robotic arm, the searing heat poised at his throat. Only a monster could think of such a thing as an upgrade.  

Sendak’s in the hull of the ship now, Shiro reminds himself, pacing around like a caged beast, or still pounding his fist against the barrier. Even so, he doesn’t like the idea of him being so close.

“You knew him, didn’t you?” Keith asks, as if sensing his thoughts.  

“Yes,” Shiro says, not wanting to say anything more.

Instead, he looks at Keith, hair hanging over his face, dark bruises on his pale skin. Keith is strong, stronger than anyone he’s ever known, but at this moment, he looks as if his wounds are catching up to him.  

And Shiro thinks: They’re far from home. Keith had seemed to be the one least upset about leaving Earth, but the gravity of the situation hits Shiro. They can’t return, not like this, not with the Galra following their every move. Alone. In space. With Shiro as the commanding officer. 

With anyone else, he can’t be anything but a leader, a role that he seems to fall into easily. And he likes that, being able to help and take care of others, to remind himself he can help, not always be helped. But with Keith, it’s always been different.

 _Too soon,_ he reminds himself: this is selfish, to cling to what’s familiar in the jagged pieces of his mind. There are a thousand reasons why having _anything_ with Keith is a bad idea. Their need to focus on the war, the years between them, and it’s unfair to the team—having a favorite. He knows better than this.

Still, he doesn’t want to worry Keith, but can’t continue like this. Gently, Shiro pulls away, ribs aching at the motion.

“It’s been a long day—night,” Shiro corrects. “Let’s get some rest.”  

Keith smiles wearily. “I can agree with that.” He nods towards Shiro, heading for the room across from his. Shiro thinks he looks as if he wants to add something else, but Keith only says a soft, “Good night, Shiro,” and steps through the open doorway.   

* * *

Sendak stands over him again, triumphant and smug, face lit sinisterly by the glowing crystal. _I’m impressed you managed to escape,_ he says. _Perhaps it would be worth the trip to your planet to see if the rest of your kind has your spirit._

And with a blink of his eyes, there’s fire. A cry tears out of his throat. But it’s not headed for him at all—instead, it’s streaking towards a distant blue planet. Sendak’s laugh fills his ears: The Garrison, the canyon, all of it is burning. _They will all end up broken, like you, like you, like you._

“No!” Shiro shouts. He hears more mocking laughter and keeps turning around, trying to spot Sendak, when there are suddenly screams.

The lions are flying in formation in the ash-blackened sky, eyes glowing deep red, roaring, _destroying_ _Earth_. Sendak is piloting one of them—Red—

The paladins. Keith. He sees them now all lined up like prisoners on death row, all of them in chains and in the same dirty gray tunics, blinking under arena lights. Every monster Shiro’s ever fought is slinking around them, growling and monstrous and looming, but when he charges forward, reaching out with his hand, there’s nothing more than a ragged stump. Someone calls his name, desperately, then another, until he can hear nothing but cries for help. He grabs for something, anything, and Lance is now deadweight in his arms, clad in paladin armor, head dangling towards the ground.

_Now that we have Voltron, every planet, every race, will all share the same fate._

Lance turns to ashes in his hands. Allura sinks lifelessly to the ground, silver hair pooling around her head like blood. Pidge calls for her brother and father in a terrified voice, as Sendak’s claws close around her throat. Hunk’s flung into the depths of space, screaming in terror and babbling pleas. And Keith, Keith’s gasping for breath, holding his side as the gladiators close in, arm limply holding onto a sword.

“Take me!” Shiro screams. “I’m the one you want! Please!”

Something hot plunges into his chest, glowing purple, and Shiro opens his eyes to see himself, blood raked across his face, eyes glowing gold, clad in his prison rags. Behind him, Haggar is laughing, hands outstretched like a puppeteer, and he can hear the roar of _Champion, Champion, Champion_ , as darkness closes in on him—

Shiro shoots up, awake and panting. Everything is dark, except for the gentle greenish-blue light from underneath his door. Dimly, he notices his blankets lying on the floor—kicked off, most likely, in his sleep. He wonders if he’d screamed. Wonders if anyone heard.

He carefully rolls out of bed. Takes his armor down from the wall. Begins his push-ups.  

* * *

Lance emerges from the pod acting like his old self. Hunk and Coran come back with the crystal and a rescue mission. They run into renegades, free a planet, and battle the Galra. All the activity keeps Shiro’s mind busy, which he’s thankful for—the last thing he wants is downtime.  

But, of course, there’s eventually a lull—too much time to think.

So he begins to wander the castle—bigger than any building he’s been in with its endless hallways and rooms, with the fully-stocked kitchen Hunk’s enamored with, the multiple labs and consoles Coran and Pidge pop in and out of every day, even a library full of books and tablets and holographic films, though all in Altean. He’s discovered a ballroom with impeccably-polished marble-like floors, a pool—albeit somewhat useless with it being on the ceiling—with luxurious pillars, and rooms of wardrobes full of robes and capes in varying shades of deep blue that Shiro doesn’t dare to touch. There’s even a meadow on the upper deck—for what purpose, he doesn’t know—with rows of empty planter boxes that Hunk will probably take over with his culinary experiments.   

His favorite is the observation deck. It’s beautiful during the night, devoid of shouting and flashing panels and holographic screens, the wide window open to the deep expanse of space. He feels a little bit like his old self, staring out into the depths filled with the pinpricks of stars and the beauty of unexplored planets. The feeling of expansion, elation in his chest— _space euphoria,_ the Garrison still called it _—_ struck by the sheer impossibility of what’s out there.  

 _And now,_ he thinks.

But still. Space is like the ocean. Beautiful and terrible all at once, and he feels safe enough to fall asleep on the deck, cheek pressed against the cool glass, and dream of stars.  

* * *

Allura’s still exhausted from the Balmera, and they end up going on another mission that turns out to be manipulated team-building by Coran.  

Shortly after the Sphinx’s mind-controlled battle, though, they fall into a small debate about Pidge’s strategy on collecting weaknesses; everyone but Keith thinks it’s intrusive. “It’s smart,” he insists. “The Galra will know ours, and they're not going to play fair.”  

Shiro agrees: the Galra are anything but merciful, and he tries not to rub his arm, the one Pidge hacked to save herself. _That’s right_ , he’d thought. _I’m dangerous._  

“I didn’t want to hurt you guys,” Pidge says. “You know that. But...”  

“I don’t want to have to hurt anyone, either.” Hunk bows his head. “I know we’re in a war, but...guys, when we’re in there, in Voltron, we do a lot of damage. And they’re bad guys, but I don’t want to...” He seemingly trails off, but Shiro can read the shape of the word. _Kill._  

“You’re right. This is war,” Shiro says, and it’s so hard to push those words out, because Hunk is just a kid and should be in the Garrison, with his family. He falls into step with Hunk, trying to choose his next words carefully. “And we have to make hard choices, but…”  

Shit. There are no easy answers, no non-patronizing platitudes, nothing he can do. He’s just in his twenties; if life were different, he’d be partying with Matt or finishing a degree. He doesn’t know how to be this rock, still.  

 _This isn’t about you,_ Shiro reminds himself. What would he want someone to say to him? What would Sam Holt say?  

“Mercy is our strength,” Shiro says at last. “You think about these things, Hunk, and that’s important to be a defender of the universe. A hero.”  

“Hero?” Hunk shakes his head. “Shiro, that’s definitely not me. I stopped puking in my lion weeks ago, but I still...I’m not brave. Like, at all.” 

“You’re scared, yes, but you’re one of our bravest,” Shiro replies. “Why? Because you’re scared, and you look it in the face, and you try anyway to save others. That’s the bravest thing I know of.” 

Hunk looks up at him. “Thanks, Shiro,” he says, and the relief on his face is so strong that Shiro lets himself believe, just for a second, that things will be okay. If only he can be that certain with himself.  

* * *

It’s his idea: “We have Sendak,” Shiro concludes. “We might as well get what we can out of him.” 

Coran confirms that they might be able to get information out of him through the similar technology Allura uses to communicate with King Alfor. With that, Keith simply says, “Good”; Lance takes it all in with narrowed eyes; Hunk nods thoughtfully, hand coming up to rest on his chin; and Pidge’s eyes light up, gears in her mind working a mile a second.  

“He's awake at the moment, but he needs to go into stasis for his mind to...relax enough for the technology to do its job,” Coran adds, and the optimistic excitement in the air dissipates. “That means moving him to another pod.”   

“So, we shoot him with a tranquilizer dart or something,” Lance suggests.  

Coran shakes his head. “It’s not going to be that easy. Where he’s at wasn’t meant to be a prison.”  

“No doorways,” Keith says thoughtfully. “When Allura activated it, it was this—bubble. If we release him, the whole thing will come down, and if we’re not fast enough...”  

Everyone exchanges nervous glances.  

“I can do it,” Shiro says, turning to Allura. “Princess, everyone should guard key facets of the castle—the escape pods, the weapons rooms, the crystal, so Sendak has no chance of escaping.” 

“What?” Keith snaps. “Shiro, this is crazy. You’re not doing this alone.”  

“And he just has one arm now,” Lance adds.  

“He’s still dangerous,” Shiro says. 

Keith, though, bristles. “What, you’d let us go out and fight hordes of Galra fighters but not one guy?”  

“It’s not that I don’t—” Shiro begins.  

“We _all_ fought him,” Pidge interrupts. “And he’s in here because we worked together.” Every inch of her blazes with determination, and he remembers she was the one who took down Haxus, sliced Sendak’s arm away from his body. He knows she’s right, and so is Keith.  

Shiro takes a deep breath. “If we surround him...Pidge, you can stun him with your bayard. At the same time, Lance and Hunk fire their guns. Knock him out, and we can move him into the containment unit. And of course, we shut down anything that he can use.”  

“I can guard the crystal,” Allura says.  

“And I, the control area,” Coran adds. “We’ll have the castle on lockdown, just in case.”  

It’s clear no one likes that idea either, but everyone nods, determined. 

“All right,” Shiro says. “Let’s get started.”

Hunk blanches. “Right now?”

* * *

Sendak’s there, waiting for them, both eyes glowing eerily in the darkness. Shiro wonders if the Galra can see in the dark, wonders why he didn’t notice that in prison—or remember. He can see the tips of his fangs when they approach, all clad in armor and bayards ready.

“Come to finish the job? No,” he says immediately, fixing his eyes on Shiro. “You’re too weak.”

His veins afire, Shiro slams his hand against the button, deactivating the barrier. Lance and Hunk and Pidge leap forward with their bayards, and Sendak collapses to the floor, teeth still bared in a grin. After that, maybe he hauls and tosses Sendak into the containment with a bit more force than necessary, but no one has to know.

* * *

For the rest of the day, Lance seems off. He pokes at the food goo during lunch, stays silent through Hunk and Pidge’s steady banter, and doesn’t even smile when Allura compliments him during a training session. 

That evening, while everyone’s drifted off to different parts of the castle, Shiro catches Lance in the hallway, slinking towards his room. “Hey,” he says casually, carefully.

“Hey,” Lance replies. He gestures towards his door. “Just...long day.” 

“It was,” Shiro agrees. 

“Sendak…” Lance trails off. “You knew him, didn’t you? Even before we first met Allura and found the lions? Your face, when he appeared on the screen...”

Shiro nods. Lance, it seems, is more observant than anyone gives him credit for. “I did.”

“I’m not sure how you even…” Lance waves a hand. “I mean, I was in and out of it, but I heard you. You kept _going._ How did you do that?” 

 _I heard you_ reverberates in the distant part of Shiro’s brain. “What?” 

“He kept hurting you. I heard. And you kept going, and I…” Lance takes a deep breath. “I guess it’s now hitting me. I almost _died_ ,” he says. “And I guess I should have prepared more for that—all those things that could go wrong in space with the gravity and black holes and fuel and explosions and space madness. But they never taught us about aliens in the Garrison.” 

“No,” Shiro says. It’s an understatement. He knows bits and pieces from Pidge and Keith, and occasionally Lance, of what the Garrison buried. Shiro wonders if the Garrison knew all along about aliens, but sent the crew out there anyways, to their doom, or if the Garrison found out about aliens the same time he and the Holts did and didn’t know what to do—looked away and pretended it never happened. He’s not sure what’s worse. 

Lance goes on: “And I just started thinking, ‘What if I don’t come home? What will they say to my family?’ They probably just pegged us as runaways, and I can’t do that, not after everything—all the sacrifices they made to help me even apply for the Garrison. And I want to let them know I didn’t forget. I didn’t just leave them—I didn’t—I’m trying.” With that, Lance buries his face in his hands, shoulders shaking, low whimpers in his throat, and for a few horrible seconds, Shiro freezes. 

In retrospect, this was a long time coming for at least one of the paladins. Maybe they keep it inside and buried it deep, as Allura and Coran do, or throw themselves into something, anything else to let it out. Pidge, with her search and tech and questions. Keith, with his everyday training sessions with the gladiators. Hunk, with his alien culinary experiments. And him—

Well. He’s surprised his hasn’t come yet. Perhaps it never will. 

“Lance,” Shiro tries, placing a hand on his shoulder. “Lance. I know your dedication, and if there was any way to get a message to Earth, I would put you first in line.” He doesn’t say that even if Coran or Allura could somehow broadcast a message to Earth, they might not follow through; the Empire had their ways of tracking, after all. 

“If I died, they wouldn’t know,” Lance whispers. “And I keep telling myself I’ll see them again, tell them myself, but…” Another shudder. “How did you get through this before, Shiro? Does all of this go away?” 

 _Yes,_ Shiro wants to say. _It’s an obstacle to overcome, but there’s a cure, there’s hope, there’s something at the end of the tunnel. The fear: you keep outrunning and keep looking ahead and you’ll reach the end one day._

But he also wants to say, _it never quite goes away, even when you wish it would. But sometimes you don’t, not even if you were offered the chance to forget completely. You hold onto it; if you possess it, you can prove that it happened to you, even if it tears you apart._

“No,” he says at last. “Not completely.” 

Lance swipes at his eyes. “Thought so. I…” He tries for a grin, but it sits wrong on his face. “Whew. That was…a lot. Um.” 

Shiro spares him from the shame of saying more: “I’m here if you ever need to talk,” he reassures, and Lance nods, opens his mouth, then slips into his room. 

* * *

That night, Shiro wanders the castle again.  

It reminds him of those hospital trips, waiting for test after test to come back and confirm what they already knew. He remembered watching his father fade away, his mother fall into the role of her husband’s caregiver, being shuffled to his grandparents before accepting a full scholarship to the Garrison.  

His mother had been disappointed by his “reckless choice”—which wasn’t a new occurrence. She told him that it wasn’t practical, that his dad wouldn’t have wanted this either, and Shiro had rebutted with a “what about what _I_ want” and it had dissolved into a terrible fight, ending with slammed doors and without so much as a goodbye. 

He wonders if she got the news about Kerberos. If the rest of his family did, armed against him, the eternal ticking clock. If they mourned—or accepted it. It was fate, after all.  

He wanted to ask Keith if they contacted the Garrison, attended his memorial, even asked after his possessions.

But he knows, just as he knew when launch day came and went with Keith by his side. The only one who waved goodbye. The only one he ever had.

* * *

The team gathers around to watch, and Shiro realizes that while everyone was worried about transferring Sendak, no one had objected to this—this sanitary interrogation. This is something the old Shiro wouldn’t have been okay with. He would have grappled with the ethics, the invasiveness, the necessity—

Yes. This is wartime. Whatever it takes.

But there’s no discernable reaction from Sendak as the process begins, nor any thought whatsoever. Soon enough, everyone gets impatient, drifting away one by one until only Shiro remains.

“I know you’re in there, Sendak,” he whispers. “I know you have all the answers.” _The answers I don’t have._ “Give them to me.” _Give them, you took them, all of you did._ Rage overtakes him for a brief second, and he slams his fist against the glass. “You’re a broken soldier! You can’t hold out forever.” 

But there’s no response, and with that, Shiro lets his hand fall limply to his side. _You’re acting like a child,_ he thinks. _Like a child throwing a temper tantrum._

This can’t continue. He needs to be calm, composed. What was he always telling Keith? _Patience yields focus._ What kind of leader can’t follow his own advice?

He just needs to step back. Concentrate on planning, in learning every section of the galaxy he can, to be ready for any possible outcome. To protect the team.

* * *

 _I see you’ve spent time with the druids. They do love to experiment._  

Cold metal around his wrists, being pinned down on a table. Bright lights stinging his eyes. Haggar, in her dark cloak, silver hair and hood swinging over her face, looking down at him with an unreadable expression.  

And pain. So much pain— 

Shiro wakes up, back soaked with sweat. The coolness hits his skin, and he shivers violently, trying to calm the panicky beating of his heart. This time, the blankets are tangled around his legs, but he kicks them onto the floor and tries to go over all of the breathing exercises his grandfather taught him, the ones Adeam helped him through during particularly difficult attacks.

 _Attacks_ , like he can fight against them, like—no. He closes his eyes, begins listing space missions. All the dates, all the astronauts, all the things they discovered. And maybe someday, his mission will be handy for some other flailing astro-explorer—Kerberos Mission, Commander Samuel Holt and assistant scientist Matthew Holt and pilot Takashi Shirogane, supposed to discover life in the space among ice crystals but—

Shiro stops, and sighs. This has been taken from him, too. 

* * *

They’re practicing drills with their bayards against the drones. Normally, Lance would protest, saying they’d be in their lions most of the time, but either the battle with Sendak has made him realize that won’t always happen, or if he simply forgets to complain today.  

Keith is by far the best. Pidge, surprisingly, is second, using her speed and long-distance bayard to keep her enemies at bay. Lance, though he’s excellent at defense, is more suited to longer range, especially with his bayard as a sharpshooting weapon, and it’s the same with Hunk. His cannon, while powerful, is still unwieldy and heavy for the paladin to use.  

It’s easy to fall into the rhythm of teaching, of different methods for the paladins to try out. But at the same time, he wishes someone could spot him—not that there had been any classes at the Garrison on how to fight with a robotic arm.  

And he knows that no matter how many drills or practices they do, there’s always a chance of it going to hell while they’re out there.  

“I wish there was a way for this to be more organic,” he mentions while they’re taking a quick breather. 

“You mean like fight actual opponents on the ground?” Keith asks, taking a sip from one of the juice boxes. “I’d suggest sparring, but none of us are really good enough.”  

“Speak for yourself!” Lance protests, just as Hunk says, “Harsh, but true.”   

“Except Shiro,” Pidge says, crossing her legs. “And no offense, Lance, but Keith’s been kicking your butt for the past few sessions.” 

“Despite being a dropout,” Lance mutters.  

“And how does it feel to lose to one?” Keith shoots back.  

“That’s enough,” Shiro interrupts. The two have been getting along slightly better, but still know how to hit each other’s nerves. “We all have room for improvement. But,” he admits, “a demo might be useful.” It had been helpful to see some techniques before jumping into sparring, back at the Garrison. “Keith? How do you feel about a match?”  

Keith smirks. “Let’s do it,” he says, rising to his feet.  

Shiro stands, too. The others scurry off to the edges of the ring, Hunk leaning forward with a juice box clutched in one hand and Pidge leaning back against the wall, adjusting her glasses.  

“Money’s on Shiro,” Lance declares.  

Hunk frowns. “Lance, none of us have—” 

Ignoring them, he and Keith walk out to the middle of the room, and Shiro’s reminded of hands wrapped in tape and safety helmets that the instructors insisted they wear during classes, the cushioned mats, the punching bags hanging from the ceiling, the beat-up shields for rogue projectile training.

He misses that as much as he chafed at it: the security, the pristineness, the routine. Trays with the optimum amount of nutrition and cholesterol and fat and sugars. Curfew, even for the officers, save for the nightly patrols around the Garrison. Coming and going at a specific time, on the dot, in pristine uniform.

Shiro dismisses it immediately. He misses what was familiar to him; that’s all. If he had to go back, he’d—but what’s the use?

“What’s the end goal?” Keith asks, snapping him out of his thoughts. 

“I disarm you,” Shiro decides. There’s the possibility of hand-to-hand later, like the old days, but that’s not the lesson he’s supposed to teach now. 

Keith nods. “Timed?”  

“No. Let’s see how long you can last.”  

“That’s what she said,” Lance calls out, then grunts, obviously smacked by Pidge.  

Keith slides into a fighting stance, broadsword flickering to life. His limbs are longer, jawline sharper, face still set in fiery determination, but Shiro knows some things haven’t changed.   

He waits, and just as he thought, it doesn’t take long for Keith to charge forward. They meet with a clash, and Shiro takes a brief moment to admire Keith’s strength before locking their arms, jab at ready.  

Keith twists away, and the next moments are filled with swings and kicks and punches, falling into old patterns like a dance, despite with new weapons. He’s quick and agile and wielding his bayard as if it’d been born in his hand, ignoring the stray strands of hair in his eyes. Shiro used to try to get him to pull the ends back, knowing that there was no one on Earth who could get Keith to opt for a buzzcut, but it was a losing battle.  

They meet again in the middle, sweat running down their faces. “You’re getting good,” Shiro breathes. 

“You’re not too bad yourself,” Keith replies, then spins, sword flashing.  

Fast as lightning, Shiro plants his foot on top of the blade, grinning when Keith struggles to pull away. “There’s no leg-sweeping in sword-fighting.” 

Keith smirks. “Can’t blame a guy for trying,” he says, then drops the hilt and lunges for Shiro.  

Nearly tripping backwards, Shiro braces himself as Keith’s weight knocks him to the floor. Immediately, Keith’s forehead slams into his, and Shiro winces, head ringing, as Keith snatches his sword off the ground and points it deftly at his face. “You still have a hard head.”  

There’s a joke in there somewhere, definitely Matt-worthy, but it’s soon lost in another flurry of attacks. 

“Did Keith lose, though?” he hears Hunk whisper.  

“He threw the bayard away; he didn’t lose it,” Pidge corrects, as Keith swings his blade—the angle is exactly right, swinging at Shiro’s neck like an executioner’s ax, but jerking to the side, Shiro rolls to his feet, catching the blade with his right hand as it comes down. Keith’s face is priceless—shocked and amazed and…something else all at once—and Shiro takes advantage, yanking his hand backwards.

The force wrenches Keith forward, sending him stumbling, and Shiro twists his arm, trying to disarm him, but Keith holds on stubbornly, gritting his teeth as his wrist wrenches to the side.

“Tap out,” Shiro orders, not wanting to injure him unduly. He doesn’t like the idea of anyone being out of commission unless there’s a dire emergency, but knows how stubborn Keith is.

Sure enough, Keith doesn’t give in. “You haven’t gotten my sword yet,” he says, then sweeps his leg out.

It doesn’t connect—Shiro jumps backwards, just as Keith’s shield flickers to life.

“Wait,” Lance interrupts, “is that allowed—“

Before he can finish his sentence, Shiro’s right fist connects with the shield, hard enough for Keith to slightly stumble backwards. Shiro keeps it up, pummeling again and again to keep Keith off-balance. Keith’s shield flickers on and off, his bayard swinging a bit more uncertainly, and with a flick of his wrist, Shiro sends it clattering to the ground, right hand pointed at the bare expanse of Keith’s neck.   

“Guess you win,” Keith says, with a slight smirk.  

There’s a round of applause from the sidelines, a whoop from Lance.  

“That was pretty good,” Hunk offers, clearly impressed.  

“It was!” Pidge’s eyes light up, hands clasping in front and trembling with eagerness. “What if...instead of just Keith, we all come at Shiro? And he uses his arm—for real, this time?”  

The air leaves his lungs. “My arm,” Shiro repeats numbly, slowly lowering it from Keith’s neck.

“Yeah, how many weapons like yours are out there?” Pidge reasons. “Sendak had one; maybe others do, too.”  

“It’s not a bad idea,” Keith agrees.

“Sendak had an arm like Shiro’s,” Lance says. “It’s probably good for us to know—”  

“No,” Shiro says firmly. “No, it’s too dangerous.” He stands taller, allows his voice to be commanding, shutting this down before it can go any further. “Let’s continue. Activate training level three.” 

* * *

 

The castle calls to him like a ghost, and he paces the halls, walking up and down and around the endless corridors, hand sometimes tracing the wall like he’s trying to find his way back. There’s dead air everywhere, the inevitable silence of space. The bridge is hauntingly beautiful at night, glowing silver and blue, the expanse of stars and promise.  

He remembers the thrill of the simulator, his first flight, but conjuring that happiness now is so foreign, a long-forgotten memory. Every memory seems tinged with bitterness, or the need for escape, and he’s reminded that even after all this time, he’s still running. Hoping for a better future.

Someday, if that exists.  

“Shiro?”

Shiro turns, sees Keith lingering in the entryway, without his jacket and gloves, his hair tangled around his face. All he has on is a black shirt and rumpled jeans. He wonders if Keith knows about the paladin pajamas Lance managed to scrounge up, or if Keith found the idea of wearing a dead man’s clothes too morbid. Maybe Keith takes comfort in his own Earth garments, or he simply doesn’t want to wear fuzzy red lion slippers.

The thought brings a rare smile to his face. “Keith,” he says. “Can’t sleep?”

“Not at all,” Keith replies, then crosses the room, settling beside Shiro in comfortable familiarity. His arms fold across his chest as he leans forward to better see outside, nose nearly touching the glass. “Reminds you of something, huh?”

Yes, he does. Slipping out of his apartment when the numbers tick on his datapad. Breezing through all the locked doors and sneaking past checkpoints. Meeting Keith, swathed in black like he was going on some secret mission. “I can’t believe we used to do that.”

Keith smirks. “Climbing up roofs to stargaze, sneaking out after curfew for a cheap burger, jumping off cliffs with hoverbikes—Iverson would have gotten an aneurysm if he knew what you were up to.” 

“If I remember correctly, you were there for almost all of those,” Shiro replies wryly.

With a perfect look of innocence, Keith places a hand to his heart. “Dragging a hapless young cadet on dangerous pursuits? _Lieutenant_ , you scoundrel.”

Shiro nudges him in response. “Like I would let anything happen to you.”

At that, Keith turns away, and Shiro catches the slightest quirk of his lips, the sudden reddening across his face, visible even in this light. He curses himself—too close.

Shiro knows this: Keith makes him feel—no, _reminds_ him—that he’s alive. And that scares him, the boy sitting stoically in a waiting room chair while his parents weep, that he can’t do this. Can’t be strong enough, has to be held up.

But Keith looks at him like he’s the same Shiro. Looks at him like nothing’s changed, only that he’s back.

“You know,” Keith says at last, “when I said I’d be your co-pilot, I didn’t think of this.”

“Who could have?”

“I…never thought I’d get the chance. After.”

Shiro places his left hand on Keith’s shoulder. “Keith.”

“Sorry,” Keith roughly says, but doesn’t shrug off his touch.

Without a word, he embraces Keith. Keith’s arms come around Shiro’s waist, dropping his head on his shoulder, and they hold each other for the longest time, rocking a little in place. Shiro can feel the tickle of hair against his nose, the newly-formed muscles against his palms, all the words tightening up and fighting to burst out of Keith’s body—in the ridges of his shoulders and spine. He wonders if Keith has the dog tags he’d hurriedly thrust into Keith’s hands the night before the launch. Wonders if he even has the right to ask. Wonders how many things have changed between them.

 _I remembered you,_ Shiro wants to say. _You helped keep me alive, all that time. I don’t remember much, but I knew you, when I woke up that morning and saw you sleeping at my bedside._

“You don’t have to apologize for anything,” he says instead, still holding Keith. “I can’t imagine what you went through.” He knows, of course, that Keith got booted from the Garrison—but never pushed further, knowing it was something Keith needed to tell Shiro himself if he wanted. Knows the importance of having something to yourself.

Keith shakes his head. “It was hard…losing you,” he whispers, like a secret. “But you went through harder things. If you ever need…”

 _Tell me the truth. Tell me what’s wrong. I’m not a little kid anymore; I can handle it._  

It seems like such a long time ago, when the worst thing Keith could know about him was his ticking clock, his weakness. But now...Shiro doesn’t know what to do. Talk about it? Forget about it? How can he do either of those things?

 _I’ve killed,_ he imagines saying to the team. To Keith. _Not all of them were like the monsters we’ve fought, some were prisoners like I was._ Pidge had hugged him for saving her brother. _But I’ve killed Matts. So many far away from home. I was their entertainer, their executioner. I’m no champion._  

 _No hero._  

“I’m fine,” Shiro says. Steps away. Gives Keith a faint smile, so he knows it’s not him. “You should get some rest, Keith. We have a long day tomorrow.”  

* * *

The next drill, Shiro goes harder on them. They can’t rest. They don’t know the danger.  

 _What if they’re tracking him? What if they let him escape on purpose? Will he betray them?_  

 _What was the first rank you held in Zarkon’s army?_ Shiro asks on the next round with Sendak looming over him like a specter.

“You need a break,” Coran tells him, when he falls asleep in the library for the third night in a row.

_Where did you find the Red Lion?_

“Join us in the lounge,” Hunk offers, after another grueling training session. “I made space cookies.” 

_What is Zarkon’s greatest weakness?_

“Shiro,” Keith says, quietly, as they go to their separate rooms for the night. “Are you okay?”

_If you were to attack Zarkon, where would you strike? What are your numbers? Where are the supply routes? The main bases? All the names of your ranking commanders? Is there a safe haven for you? Is anywhere safe?_

* * *

He and Allura and Coran are the only ones who go to early morning strategy meetings. To Shiro’s disappointment, Keith prefers the sparring room to gathering around a table, and the rest want to sleep or work on their own individual projects or avoid sitting still like the plague.

This is why they turn to him, but all the same—Shiro wishes they’d come to at least one session and not have to rely on Coran or Allura’s quick rundown during a time of need.

 _I don’t know,_ Shiro wants to say sometimes. But it’s not like at the Garrison—he can’t excuse himself and duck into the library or quickly scroll through articles on his datapad or even pop by a lab and ask for Sam—and he can’t even feign ignorance to make them learn, like Adam used to do with his students—this is something no one’s ever prepared him for.

And to be honest, Shiro doesn’t know what to do with teenagers. He knows he shouldn’t be thinking that way; they’re cadets in their own right and have done things officers back on Earth never dreamed were possible. But races down the halls on what Lance calls _space Roombas_ and terrible (often inappropriate) jokes and popcorn battles during movie nights make him feel old at the age of twenty-three.

He never really got those experiences, after those tests, after his dad was diagnosed, with his family turning every ailment he had this way and that, and more. Murmurs whenever he tripped over a fold in the carpet or fumbled a dish while cleaning up after dinner or grew tired during an impromptu soccer game—a list of symptoms, a slippery slope. There was hand-wringing whenever he got back a few minutes late from after-school clubs, wailing when he climbed one of the trees in the backyard. And after his dad—

He supposes that’s how he and Keith understood each other from the get-go, but doesn’t want to boil it down to this— _fellow orphans,_ linked together by tragedy and nothing else. (And he technically wasn’t an orphan, anyway, with just one parent dead.) But there had been a quiet understanding, with tidbits about Keith’s dad and being pulled out of class and being shuffled farther and farther from home.

The other paladins—well, they don’t know. They don’t want this. They’ve gotten used to saving the universe, but everyone wants to go home. Everyone has something waiting for them.

 _Don’t expect me to be here when you get back,_ he remembers. 

* * *

Really, he has no right, Shiro thinks, when he accidentally comes across the princess on his way to ask Coran about learning Altean.

She’s kneeling in front of her father’s AI, mice curled up in her skirts. They speak a language he does not know, sitting in a simulated field of green grass and pink-and-purple flowers.

Once in a while, she laughs, but her smile never quite reaches her eyes. Her hand reaches up, then drops, remembering that this isn’t her father, just an imprint, something her touch will go through as if he’s a ghost.

Shiro quietly slips away.

* * *

Pidge tries to come with him once, to interrogate Sendak. “He might have information where my family is,” she argues, clutching her tablet in her hands.  

“We aren’t giving up on them,” Shiro reassures her. 

Shaking her head, Pidge blurts: “I want to find them. You get it, right? You have to; I know the entire universe has families,” she says, and Shiro realizes she’s quoting Keith, wonders if they ever patched that up. “But this is important.” She looks up at him, fierce but pleading, and he sees so much of Matt that his chest clenches. “Last time, you were going to let me go when Keith tried to stop me.” 

Shiro sighs. He knows he can’t take sides, but he did mean what he said earlier. No one could be forced to stay if they didn’t want to; Adam had taught him that.

On the other hand, Keith was right in his way, practical as he was during the Sphinx mission—the greater good counted. It was debated in every philosophy class, drilled into every lesson in piloting class: the mission mattered the most. If someone was a danger, a hindrance…

He remembers the harshness of Professor Montgomery’s anecdote about cutting someone loose from their safety cable, letting a body drift into the deep yawning of space. The horrified hush of the class. The way she’d folded her hands and said, _This could happen. What would you choose?_

“Keith never had one, did he?” she continues. “A family, I mean.”  

“That’s Keith’s business,” Shiro says firmly. He doesn’t know how much the team knows, but the Garrison was a hotbed of gossip. He remembers helping Keith to the infirmary after his fight with Griffin; secretly, he wouldn’t have minded, if it weren’t for Keith’s record, if he’d got another punch in before Iverson restrained him. (This, he thinks, was why he hadn’t been so quick to rush out of the room when the fight broke out.)

But Pidge keeps pushing: “I’m just saying—he might not see things the way the rest of us do. He doesn’t know what it’s like.”

“He does,” Shiro interrupts, too harshly. He feels skinny arms around his waist. Himself unfastening his dog tags. Draping them over Keith’s head. 

“I’m sorry,” Pidge says, chastised.

Shiro takes a deep breath, choosing his words carefully. “I want to find Sam and Matt as much as you do. But Keith was right in a sense: the universe is counting on us to hold it together. The greater mission comes before everything else.”

“But what about the paladin code? To help anyone in need?”

“That’s what we’re doing.” 

“Then if you believe that,” Pidge insists, “why did you let me go?”

_This isn’t a mission. This is your life._

Shiro closes his eyes. _My life. My mistakes. Mine_. “I believe people have to make their own choices, regardless of what happens. They don’t know where that will take them, but at the very least, they had a choice.”   

Pidge hesitates, then says in a smaller voice, “But, Shiro, what if I didn’t come back?”

“You would have,” Shiro says simply. He doesn’t dare think of what would have happened if she hadn’t. 

 _I was wrong,_ he wants to say. But how would anyone ever trust him again, if the decisive head of Voltron faltered? How would he keep them together? He thinks of Hunk and Lance, looking up to him so trustingly, to assuage their fears, to be their guide, to be in command, the wormhole to unknown destiny yawning in front of them. 

_Shiro, you’re the senior officer here. What should we do?_

They were all here because of his decision. All in danger, and he was responsible. 

_I’ve had one crew captured by aliens. I’m not letting that happen again._

Now, Shiro says, more firmly: “You can’t go down there. But if I find out anything, I’ll tell you. I promise.”  

* * *

When Shiro isn’t training or planning, he’s wandering the castle. He can’t seem to be with anyone, mood settling over him, his head fogging.  

Whatever little time Shiro has to himself, he spends in the room with Sendak, trying to get answers, knocking on the glass like a kid’s tentative tap on a closed door.

Or dangling himself like bait. _Here I am. Come and get me._

* * *

Shiro allows himself a moment of weakness, once.

He hasn’t done this in a long time, and it’s clumsy, at first, with his left hand, his other stretched far away from his body. Shiro closes his eyes and tries to take his mind away, and he thinks—wishes—Keith were here.

Keith would be above him, dark hair falling into his eyes, closed as he rode Shiro, hisses loud in the dark. There would be bites of fingernails across his shoulders, teeth at his neck, his own hand braced against the wall. It would be the frenzy of adrenaline, of being so far away from Earth, of having nothing but space around them. With Keith—the undeniable human warmth that’s been so absent in his life; the familiarity of hands that would touch Shiro with tenderness, the same hands that wield a sword like it’s been born wrapped around his fingers; the juxtaposition of peace and war compact in his body.  

He thinks back to their last sparring session—how powerful and fierce he was, how he sprang like a tiger to knock Shiro off balance, pinning him to the mats. Their breaths mingle, here, and Keith leans in, grip growing stronger, eyes shining. “Show me your hand,” he says.

Shiro freezes. “What?”

“Your hand,” Keith repeats. His own hands are pressing harder around his wrists. “Let me see it—” And suddenly, his face _transforms_ —teeth to fangs, flesh to fur, hands to claws—and Sendak’s face looms over him, and Shiro kicks, but the weight is too much, crushing— _let me go, let me go, let me go—_

Faster than lightning, his right hand shoots forward, powerful and deadly and going through Sendak’s chest, and he tastes blood and dust and it’s a hole punched through someone’s chest, no longer Sendak’s—a gray tunic like his—those eyes, scared and going blanker and blanker—and he pulls away, vomiting onto the ground, gasping for breath—

And he’s back in the training room, Keith now standing in front of him without a sword, without armor, and Shiro raises his right hand, walking towards him in slow, heavy steps.

“You wanted to know what this hand does,” Shiro says lowly. “Didn’t you? Well, think about what that could do to you,” he continues. His breath is now on Keith’s face, hot and furious. “I’ve punched holes into chests, through their still-beating hearts. I’ve yanked them out, even, held them up for the crowd to cheer over.” Tighter. “You’re so fragile. So _human_.”  

Keith breathes heavily, but his eyes are fixed on Shiro’s face, unmoving, and Shiro sees Myzak, the first prisoner he killed, all of them. “You’re human, too.”  

Shiro laughs, “Not anymore,” and raises his hand—

He finds himself sitting cross-legged in front of Sendak’s cell, awake and trembling and looking up at the sleeping monster, bathed in eerie blue light, and doesn’t dare fall asleep for the rest of the night.

* * *

“Shiro, we’re worried about you,” the princess says. She’s not in her armor, but in the same dress she’d been wearing the first time they’d stumbled across her castle, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. One of the mice rides on her shoulder, clutching her ear.

“I’m okay,” he says. 

She doesn’t mince words: “You’re becoming obsessed.”  

“I’m not,” Shiro says. Doesn’t she see? Little by little, there’s glowing purple swirls in the chamber, valuable information that they _need._ Perhaps not as much as they hoped, but he’s done it. Somehow, he’s done it. Cracked Sendak. _You’re mine._

“No one wants the Galra Empire defeated as much as I do,” she says fiercely. “But you’re the leader, and you’re pulling away from us. The team needs you.”  

“I’m there.”

“For drills. For missions. But not for meals, for—” Her lips form strangely around this: “Downtime.” He wonders who she picked it up from. “Being Voltron is more than being able to fight. It’s about trust, and I thought you all were on your way to it, but perhaps I was mistaken. I think the paladins will enjoy a full day of those exercises they were so fond of: the mazes, the gladiator, the nose dives, the visual meditation—”

 _No._ “You’ve been asleep for ten thousand years,” Shiro retorts. “I was tortured by them for a year, and I think I know more than you do about defending the universe, _princess._ ”

Allura straightens up, hands on her hips. “How dare you?”  

_The others don’t know what you know. They haven’t seen what you’ve seen._

“You know nothing,” he sneers. “Nothing.” _Nothing nothing nothing._

She turns on her heel, storms out the closest door, with her skirt and silver hair swinging behind her.

“Allura!” he calls. This is not him. This isn’t. “Wait—”

He runs after her, flinging himself through the double doors. He can hear hurried footsteps and swishing of fabric, and he keeps going, turning hallways and climbing staircases and calling her name, _Allura Allura Allura._ He trips over a step; she’s running from him, of course she is, but he has to make this right.

The halls swallow his cries, yet he still hears her, skittering along the marble-like floors like a mouse. He keeps running, colliding with a smaller body. Something clatters to the floor, a pair of lenses that ring out in the hallway like tiny bells. 

“Pidge,” he pleads, frantic. “Pidge, where…?”  

She shakes her head. Her outfit shifts into a gray Garrison uniform, then a space suit, then to her usual green jacket and shorts. A gloved hand holds crystals of shining ice, a tablet in the other, with strange purple letters he cannot read. “Did you lose someone else?” 

“I need to find her,” he begs. 

“Why?” Pidge crosses her arms, looking up at him accusingly. “You didn’t protect them. Why would they want to see you?” 

“Katie…” he begins, but Pidge shakes her head, a beam of violent purple light surrounding her and lifting her body up, up through the ceiling, and Shiro reaches for her, only for her to vanish like smoke. 

He turns, throws himself at another door, another, until he sees a figure, back turned to him.

Shiro reaches out, and his fingers close around something more bone than shoulder. He recognizes this, the sickly hospital smell and the faded gown and the IV trailing like a leash, and he flinches away, but a hand encircles his wrist. “Takashi,” someone says, but Shiro spins away and runs.

 _Like you always do,_ someone else hisses. Adam appears before him, in his grey officer’s uniform and bookbag, a look of dogged frustration—what Shiro remembers as his mother’s face, during those long hours, weary and exhausted but she wouldn’t let go—

“Let me go,” he pleads. “Let me go,” and he’s back, back in that dark room, strapped down to a table, masks surrounding him, white blurring his vision. “Let me go, please, we need Voltron, they’re coming, listen to me,” he insists, but the faces keep changing, changing to purple cloaks and armor and fangs, and god, his arm—the silver blade—“What have you done, let me go, I mean nothing to you, _listen_ , don’t take—” 

The blade comes down, but it transforms into a sword, into a club, glowing, as the crowds around him cheer his name: _Champion! Champion!_

_Murderer! Murderer!_

Shiro looks up into the stands, blade still raised, and sees Lance and Hunk, leaning over the balcony among the thunderous crowds. They’re both in paladin armor, and in a blink, they’re striding across the arena, bayards raised, inching slowly towards him. 

“I’m not,” Shiro says weakly. 

“You are,” Hunk says, soft but audible among the roaring crowd. His hands are shaking, but he holds firm, eyes flickering towards Lance. “You’ve killed before; you’d do it again.” 

“There’s too much blood on your hands,” Lance adds. His bayard raises, aiming the muzzle between Shiro’s eyes. “You have no mercy.” 

“I _do_ ,” Shiro insists. He raises his hands, allows the sword to fall from his fingers. 

“Then what about them?” Hunk demands, and one by one, the stands fill: all of them, the faces that visit him in his dreams, the dead manifesting among the shadows, replacing the Galra spectators. They’re now silent, looking on in a mix of fear and condemnation. “Did you show _them_ mercy?”

“I...” Shiro whispers. “I tried; I tried to…”

“You are not our leader.” Lance dismisses, and the gavel falls, their guns going off in a flash of light— 

“Shiro?” a voice says, sounding different. Closer. Only on one side, this time. “Shiro? You’ve been in here for a while.”

Mind still whirling, Shiro turns, seeing Keith, looking at him with concern, dressed in his usual black tee and jeans. Sendak is still in front of him in his containment unit, with no purple swirls in the chamber or Allura or any of the—what was that? Did he—was it—had he really yelled at Allura, or was it…

“Shiro?”

Shiro sees the gladiator swinging its spear towards him, weapon in a downward slash, Keith stepping between them with his broadsword.  

“I know,” he says shortly. “You don’t need to check in on me like a kid.”  

Keith flinches, but remains resolute. “I just wanted to see if you were okay.” He puts his hand on Shiro’s shoulder gently. No, carefully—too carefully.

Shiro pulls away. Did the others recruit Keith to pry this out of him? Do they think he’s weak, too unstable to lead them?  

“ _Shiro_ ,” Keith says again, more insistently.  

“I can handle it, Keith,” Shiro snaps, then turns away. He needs to leave. He needs to leave _now_. “You haven’t been—you don’t know him.”

“But I know you,” Keith says, and rushes forward, and Shiro’s reaching for him, grasping—and crushing Keith’s lips with his.

Keith gasps, and his eyes close as he kisses back, hands anchoring Shiro. He can feel the lithe body beneath him, all sharp edges and soft flesh, his own weight pressing into Keith’s bones. There’s a bluish glow reflecting on Keith’s face, his cheeks flushed, and Shiro backs him against the nearest wall, frantic and hungry and wanting.

His fingers reach for Keith’s belt, sliding the leather deftly out of its buckle, then moving to unfasten the button of his pants, unzipping, sharp against the silence. Keith pulls him closer, kissing him again, as Shiro slides his left hand in between their bodies, the other cupping Keith’s face.  

“Shiro,” he hears. “ _Shiro_.” Hands are moving upwards, gripping his shoulders, pushing. 

“Please,” Shiro hisses against his neck, deaf to everything but his own harsh breaths, the fire churning through his veins. He wants. God, he wants. “Please.”  

“Shiro,” Keith says, struggling beneath him—he’ll _escape_ —and Shiro tightens his grip, leans forward so more of his weight is pressed down on Keith’s chest. He would kill anyone who touches Keith, who tries to break him in the same way they broke Shiro. “ _Shiro_.”  

There’s a kick to his stomach, and Shiro grunts, bounding back, ready to fight when he sees his Galra hand, the one that was cupping Keith’s face, now around Keith’s neck, _squeezing_ —

“No,” Shiro says, jerking his hand away, and Keith falls to the floor, dissipating like smoke in the wind. “ _No_.”

And he hears Sendak laugh, cold and cruel. “I’ve heard your thoughts. I know them. I know you more than anyone else does, even yourself.” Shiro whirls around, sees Sendak grinning at him from the pod. “We’re not so different, you and I. You can never belong to a team. You’re a monster, you’re scrambled, you’re something to fear.”  

“No,” Shiro whispers.  

“You _liked_ being the Champion,” Sendak continues. “I remember how you were when you were first dragged onto my ship with the other pitiful humans. You were scared. Weak. _Begging_. And in the arena, you were transformed—reformed. Embrace it. It’s your strength.”

“No,” Shiro repeats. It seems that’s all he’s capable of saying. “No.”

Sendak bares his teeth. “The Galra Empire makes you _strong_.” 

“It made me a murderer.” His head’s raging, scorching and screaming and tearing itself apart. Something’s wrong. Something has always been wrong. But when did this start? “I will never join Zarkon,” he manages.   

“No,” Sendak taunts. “But you will never be able to defeat him. Us.” 

_Surrender. Surrender._

“Shiro?” a new voice shouts, slightly muted, panicked.

“What’s happening?”

“Something’s wrong, the castle is—”

“Tried to kill me!”   

“The crystal—”

“Shiro!”  

 _You’re just a tool of the Galra._  

 _You’re nothing. Nothing._  

“Shiro!” 

Inside his head, Sendak screams, struggling against his bonds, and Shiro finds himself on his knees, holding his head, trying to hold everything in, but it’s too much, too much, and—

He wakes up in a field of stars.  

Shiro blinks, trying to reorient himself. His mind’s still foggy, but the pain’s duller, now—almost muted. In the distance, he can hear a lion’s roar, filling his head with a strange, eerie calm, like a cool palm against a feverish forehead, like fingers moving through his hair, like taking someone’s hand in the dark.  

Yet there’s a looming awareness of exactly what’s in the dark, the animalistic part of him caught between fight or flight. But when he tries to move, he can’t. Every part of him is screaming at him to run, but it’s one of those familiar nightmares, where he can’t move at all, where every muscle in his body has failed him, where his greatest nightmare has come true.   

Shiro screams, helplessly, because it’s worse than any physical pain in his life—nothing like the clean slice through nerves and muscle and bone between cool golden eyes, or the hot flush of blood that splattered across his face, into his eyes, or any amount of claws or blades or lasers or fists landed on his flesh.       

 _Move!_ He orders himself, but nothing obeys, only pulling him in, pushing him closer, winding around his throat and squeezing— 

Claws around the fragile skin of his neck, feet lifted off the ground, a glowing red eye. _Please! We come from a peaceful planet!_ His head slammed into metal, fragments of what he’s sure is his skull scattering, purple glow highlighting sharp fangs. Someone screaming in pain—Matt—bone crunching underneath a heavy club. _Take care of your father._ And being pulled into that beam of light, limbs flailing uselessly, ground being sucked up from under them— 

 _Not a lot of time. How important am I to you? Don’t end up like me._  

White sheets, a metal cage bedframe, beeping machines. A thin IV in the crook of his arm, silver against pale skin and green-ish veins. Head tilted back, being slid into a beeping machine, hollowed out like a cave, lights dancing across his vision— 

 _Champion!_  

 _Stop,_ he pleads. _Let me go!_  

A blindfold slipping over his vision. His gloved hands on Black’s controls. Purring, at the back of his mind.  

An explosion, a body tumbling outside the castle, dust choking the air. Two figures running towards a village, illuminated in golden light and dark smoke. Another scaling through the castle, reaching for him, a purple glow looming over her shoulder like a shadow. 

“Pidge!” he gasps. “No, don’t!”  

Eyes turning towards him, deep purple, pupils narrowed into slits—fangs—strange, harsh sounds—claws—a dagger shoving itself into his mind, searching, prodding, analyzing— 

A coldness on his chest. A gloved hand on his back. A machine gliding over his body.  

A body in a bed, flowers and cards stacked in rows across the room. The sickly-sweet scent of vomit. Skeletal fingers that lie prone on sweat-ridden sheets. His own face, being pressed against a warm chest. Himself, crying.  

Knees on the ground, a crackle through his bloodstream, flesh burning. _You kept going. How did you do that?_

Rejection letters, stamped with seals and red ink. Wary glances at potlucks and stifling front rooms and schoolyards. Calypso, launching in a straight line towards the stars, trembling in his own hands. _Oh, Takashi, what a wonderful dream, but—_  

 _You’ll never be home, never—keep these safe for me—I’ll be back soon—I promise—_  

“What’s going on?”  

“I don’t know—his mind—”  

“Maybe it’s Sendak—”   

Sendak, watching him crawl helplessly towards the pitiful portions of gruel. Sendak, breaking him apart piece by piece. Sendak, who’d sent him to the druids— 

And he’s there, in front of Shiro, terrible and tall and grinning—and Shiro looks down, sees his hand beginning to morph, claws and steel and— 

 _No,_ he begs, _please, no._  

 _You are strong. You are a Shirogane. Golden pilot of the Galaxy Garrison._  

Lights, blinding him, savage cheers, dust in his teeth, prison tunic clinging to his skin, terrible and glowing—and he sees it, sees himself with yellow eyes and sharp fangs and claws extended, the perfect weapon, powerful and terrible— 

 _Kill it kill it kill it. Aren’t you tired of being afraid? Embrace it! No one can ever hurt you again!_  

He raises his sword.  

 _Shiro. Please. I love you._ _You bring hope to the galaxy._  

A blurred, unfamiliar face, with a steady hand on his shoulder. Bony arms around him, as rain pours down and the world falls apart. A brush against his forehead, moving his bangs out of the way to tuck them behind his ear, pulling him in slowly for a kiss. A hand in his, knuckles bruised, grip trusting. _All we need is a hand._  

The sword clatters to the ground, and he reaches forward.  

The claws morph into a smaller, human hand. Yellow eyes fade into tentative, shy pupils. The armor falls away, into a thin hospital gown.  

And Shiro pulls himself up.  

With that, it’s like breaking the surface after being held under for so long. He sees his younger self blinking up at him, and Shiro kneels down to his height, holds out his arms. Wraps them around him. _I’m sorry._  

“…waking up.” 

“—happened?”  

“Shiro? Shiro, we’re here.”  

He opens his eyes, coolness leaving him, the sides of the healing pod melting away, revealing the concerned faces of Lance and Pidge and Hunk and Allura, and Shiro falls, head full of cotton and hand still remembering the touch.  

Someone catches him, and this time, he lets Keith cradle him before he passes out again.  

* * *

The next time he wakes up, it’s to a tentative knock on his door.

Shiro presses the release button, and it slides open. Keith is there, bearing a tray of what looks like space goo and another one of Hunk’s concoctions in a silver dish. 

“Hey,” Keith says, still standing by the door. “I don’t know if—” he begins, then shakes his head. “We don’t know if you needed anything.”

Shiro looks at him. With anyone else, he can’t be anything but a leader, a role that he seems to fall into easily. And he likes that, being able to help and take care of others, to remind himself he can help, not always be helped.

But with Keith…

He can be vulnerable around Keith. 

“Please,” he says, “come in.”

Keith steps over the threshold, the door sliding shut behind him. “We were all so worried,” he says. “It was the crystal, Sendak, infecting the entire ship. And you…”

 “Where’s Sendak?” Shiro asks.

Keith hesitates. “In a different containment unit. After Allura was able to fix the castle, it should be fine. But…we don’t know what to do with him.”

What, indeed. “You didn’t…?”

“No.” Keith’s silent. “If you wanted—I wouldn’t stop you.”   

“No,” Shiro agrees. He suspects Keith would even help. “But this is different from facing him on the battlefield. He’s helpless. And that’s something the Empire would do.”  

“He would kill you, if given the chance,” Keith argues. “Whether it’s fair or not.”  

Shiro shakes his head. _Mercy is our strength._ “Maybe. But he still has information, and he’s one of Zarkon’s top commanders. That could be our leverage.”  

Keith frowns apprehensively. “What’s that old saying? We don’t negotiate with terrorists?” 

“I don’t trust the Galra,” Shiro says, though something in his head is unfurling, piece by piece, albeit still foggy. He saw it, wherever he was. Someone who helped him. “But for now…he’s here.” Somehow, though, that doesn’t frighten him as much as it did before.

“It got to me,” he admits. “ _He_ got to me. What did I—did I hurt you? Any of you?”

“No,” Keith says, taking a seat on the edge of Shiro’s bed, tray settling onto his lap. “Well. You resisted when we tried to snap you out of whatever it was. But, no.” He bites his lip, his fingers absentmindedly worrying the blankets furled around Shiro’s waist. “Lately, you just…you were wandering around the castle so much, and one day, you just went down there with Sendak and never came back up.”

Shiro closes his eyes. _God. God. He thought he was—Sendak, he did that to him. Or it had been him, all along, and Sendak had pulled all of that out of him. But either way, he was…Sendak. I’m Sendak._

“You’re nothing like Sendak,” Keith says fiercely, and Shiro realizes he’s spoken out loud.  

“But he was right,” Shiro insists. “He was right. And you don’t—Keith, I’m not the same man.” Everything seems to spill out all at once: “I’ve been broken. And I’m…I’m a murderer, Keith. Did you ever think I would have a body count?”  

“We joined the Garrison,” Keith says softly. “We had fighter pilots.”

“I’m just so ashamed,” Shiro whispers. “I don’t know if all of that was the crystal, Sendak, or me—and I think it’s me, Keith.”  

“It’s not you.” Keith places a hand on his, and Shiro looks down, Keith’s flesh against the cool metal, unafraid and steady. “Shiro, you are the most heroic person I’ve known in my life. What the Galra did doesn’t change that, and if anyone has something to say about it, even you—even if the world turns against you, I’ll always be by your side. I will _never_ give up on you.” 

With that, he leans forward, and Shiro does, too, not caring—for once—that they were changing everything. 

Their first kiss tastes like stardust. It reminds Shiro of watching the sun set orange and pink and gold against a red canyon, the feeling of a hover-bike purring underneath his legs, the crispness of the air among the silvery stars, laying hands on Black’s controls for the first time. Underneath, Keith shifts forward, pressing Shiro closer, hands grappling for his hair, the back of his neck—

And there’s a soft crash, and both of them whip around to see the tray of food, now turned over onto the floor.

“Oh,” Keith says, embarrassed, and Shiro laughs.

“That’s a reaction,” he says, and Keith lightly shoves him.

Together, they kneel on the floor, beginning to clean up the remnants using a stray shirt that Shiro claims is dirty. Every so often, their hands brush. Shiro feels a flush up his neck, sees a secretive smile on Keith’s lips, and Shiro can’t resist winding his fingers around Keith’s.

“Stay here,” Shiro says.                           

Keith smiles. “You don’t have to ask.”

It’s a tight fit, the bunk having been built for one, but Shiro doesn’t mind. He can feel Keith’s warmth, Keith’s head cradled against his chest, Keith’s bones and flesh and breath, all wrapped around him underneath the covers. Keith makes him feel safe. Makes him feel like he’s home.

And with that, Shiro drifts into a dreamless sleep.


End file.
